


To You in the Future

by rocketgills



Category: Kakumeiki Valvrave | Valvrave the Liberator
Genre: Insert Fic, M/M, lots of tactical talk, spoilers for the finale, using artistic lisence on that sad sad ending
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-29
Updated: 2014-01-22
Packaged: 2018-01-06 13:29:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 14,497
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1107423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rocketgills/pseuds/rocketgills
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He whispered Haruto's name into the air and it was like a spell. [NOTE: Discontinued]</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> I was devestated by the ending. I couldn't deal with what they did to Haruto and L-Elf, so I'm turning my head canon of what happened after the ending into this story.
> 
> This story spans from the end of their victory to the vision of 200 years in the future. So enjoy! I'll be updating as much as I can.

He clutched desperately at that stupid pilot suit, tugging Haruto upright where his head had fallen, lax.

"Tokishima Haruto."

This wasn't right, it really wasn't, Haruto was just talking to him, they'd just decided to stay together and save the human race together.

"T-tokishima."

Together.

"Haruto."

He didn't remember anything. He knew what the Valvrave ran on, runes, the memories of ones life, the pilot's brain. He knew what happened to Marie. He knew this was the logical end, that there was a 96.37% chance of this outcome, and then a higher chance of himself piloting a Valvrave consciously than Haruto surviving this war.

"Haruto...Haruto."

But it was so unfair, so bitter.

"Haruto!"

And L-Elf knew that shaking him, especially this violently was not useful and was more likely to damage Tokishima Haruto rather than help him.

Not that there was anything in there to help.

He let his friend's body slump to the floor. There was a thump as it fell to the side with nothing to hold it up. He was wasting energy.

He needed to get back to the other students and...what exactly? It was like Liselotte all over again. What could he have done differently? Absolutely nothing. It was a no-win situation, either fight a lose him or save him and lose him and everyone else later.

He laughed a little, vaguely acknowledging the two Magius in the UI watching him carefully.

_Is this what it's going to be like? Every single time. This is the price for freedom, and it's too high. Could you just open the cockpit.End this suffering it's too much. Please, I've lost everything already..._

These thoughts and more flew through his head but he couldn't say it, he wouldn't give in, otherwise what did Haruto die for?

He would fight. Just. Not right that moment. There was nowhere for him to go, he was genetically incapable of piloting the Valvrave anyway.

He roughly brushed a palm across his eyes as a sob ripped its way through his throat and he cried in a way he hadn't when Liselotte gave her life for him. The tears didn't stop, even when he felt calm. He doesn't remember if it was Akira or Saki who discovered them first.

Him really, Haruto was dead and he had to internalize that. It was illogical to deny facts.

L-Elf supposed that he had internalized it because even though they couldn't see the body on the comm, the voices had cut off mid sentence and no questions were asked of him.

They were almost back when he dragged himself off the pilot chair and kneeled in front of the body - and it had to be the body it wasn't Haruto anymore, that's for sure. He took its hand and held it.

He bent over and did something he didn't think he'd ever do and dropped a kiss in its hair.

His hair.

Haruto.

He stayed hunched over - and it was Haruto, Haruto was dead just like his dear princess and he'd kill him for this, he really would.

Time passed - L-Elf wasn't sure how much - and the cockpit opened. He sat up, his back stiff, his eyes sore and resolute as he looked towards whoever it was.

Saki.

He was still holding Haruto's hand. She said something and someone - Akira - made a shocked noise.

It was strange, Haruto's hand wasn't as cold as he expected it to be.

Someone came and took the body. Would there be an autopsy? He assumed so and guessed that he should follow since he was the only one present at time of death.

There was a pounding in the back of his head as he got out of the Valvrave.

He was almost completely certain that at least eight people had addressed him.

Too bad for them, because he would talk once this was done. He owed Haruto that much respect and attention, dead or not.

As he passed through the threshold into the medical bay he could have sworn he felt breath behind his ear, a whisper of laughter and a rolling of eyes.

He whispered Haruto's name into the air and it was like a spell, silencing everything but the hum of electronics and drawing eyes towards him.

He brushed brown hair out of what was once Tokishima Haruto's face and closed his eyes.

He heard a voice whisper _L-Elf_ from far away, beyond that room and out in space, and he imagines that it's what freedom sounds like.


	2. Dreamers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The grass is warm and so were you.

He watched them examine the body. He had to. If nothing else maybe the other pilots could be saved in some way. They ran test after test after test.

People said useless things like how sorry they were that they doubted him and that he was a hero and they would miss him.

It kept going and they kept running this useless autopsy.

He died from using all of his life force to defeat Cain. And that was the end of it.

Then there was brain activity.

The world came into sharp focused and his attention centered on the screens and Haruto's face. That's impossible, he hadn't been breathing for so long, his heart had stopped, so how?

And then he remembered, something so obvious and so important. On the moon Haruto had blast forth the same sort of light that the Magius let flow.

How could he do that? L-Elf knew that the students were all genetic experiments but, Haruto was something more. From what he'd manage to hear in the rushed weeks and through his grief over Liselotte, his father had created Haruto personally.

All of it was truly distasteful to L-Elf. Hadn't there been enough experimentation, enough trying to control other's lives.

He took a deep breath and was about to mention it, because really the fools were just talking in circles about things they couldn't begin to understand or even know about.

But then they said something beyond stupid,

"How do we know we can trust him?! We've never known what side he was on from the very beginning, and now he comes back with Haruto like this?!"

L-Elf can't help but let his eyes narrow in condescension. They really do think he's capable of anything, don't they, but his goals have been obvious from the beginning.

Create a safe country. Save the princess. Fight. Destroy all the lies.

Curse their mob mentality.

He is dragged out of the room, the protests of the pilots can be heard above all else but he knows cooperation is safer than doing what he wants because there is no action he can possibly take at the moment.

No matter how much he just wants to take Haruto away from them and watch him until he opens his eyes again and apologizes for dying on him.

He needed to get into Unit 1.

Easily accomplished. But when was the best time for him to do it? When they were sleeping? While they were holding Haruto's memorial? While they were transferring off this ship?

But L-Elf knew, he knew it, he knew it, he knew it Haruto was alive because he wasn't human and no mere Valvrave could drain him to the point of death because those scientists had succeeded far more than they knew.

He was closer to a Magius than any of the others.

The proof was clear, the green light, his instinctual casual use of runes, his natural occupancy of L-Elf's own body.

He laughed for the second time since he woke up.

It was all so clear, Haruto was alive and it was his responsibility and duty to save him.

He needed to do it.

Plans for the future, far and near, flashed before his eyes and he laid down in the storage room they'd stripped and dumped him in.

Two hours and he would take Haruto away and into Unit 01.

Footsteps echoed in the hallway.

Shoko was grieving, she had no idea what to do because Haruto was dead and she hadn't told him anything in the end.

She was certain L-Elf had lost his mind with all the  _not doing anything_.

She was haunted by the look she'd seen on his face when they'd got him out of the cockpit. Not only her, but everyone else that saw him. He looked...not broken like before, but deranged. Like he would kill and not for any more reason than being provoked.

At least before he was a known danger. Now? They had no idea what he would do. So even though the reason they had given for locking him up was paperthin and unnecessary, she allowed it because the shuttle needed some sort of stability until they reached Module 77.

She wanted to go in and see how L-Elf was doing. He'd eaten her cooking and had the driest humor and helped them in ways he didn't need to. Unlike most of the other students, she recognized he was a person.

But he was also a trained fighter, able to take down anything and anyone, including the Magius. And she was scared because what was more dangerous than a broken, grieving L-Elf Karlstein with a goal?

She couldn't think of anything.

So she unlocked the door because she knew he would get out anyway and left a tray of food to the side of it and went back to the bridge.

 

On the way there she loses track of herself and Saki appears before her eyes. Luckily the dark haired girl doesn't look like she'd been crying because Shoko didn't think she'd be able to handle that.

"Rukino.."

"I'm sorry," she blurted out, and she'd almost looked like she didn't want to say it.

"Why?"

Shoko sounded lifeless then, even to herself.

"I'm sorry," she repeated, because Saki was sorry, for what she'd said only to herself about losing memories, for being even, she was sorry because Haruto was dead, she was just sorry and Shoko had the displeasure of being her friend and she was trying so hard. Shoko knew Saki was trying but neither of them knew what to do with this thing they had and add a dead Tokishima Haruto on top.

Shoko said nothing else but just stood there and looked very small and lost in the eyes of Rukino Saki.

So Saki did the bravest thing she could think of and stepped closer until she could feel the heat radiating off of Shoko's skin. She wrapped her arms around Shoko's shoulders and embraced her. She cradled her friend's head under her chin and stroked her hair and repeated her apology and would continue to do so until the leader understood.

She was so very sorry. And she missed Haruto like missing limb.

Shoko trembled in her arms as she fought herself on whether to accept the comfort or get out and get far away and hide somewhere.

In the end she accepted it and cried more because it was acceptable in the circumstances and let Saki tell the others that she was off duty for the next few hours. She also let Saki take her back to her quarters on the ship because all the pilots had those and there were a few empty ones now anyway.

She let Saki sing lullabies to her until she fell asleep. And Saki felt this was what she could do, this was how she could repay Haruto and save herself, and it was by saving this girl that he cared about so much.

 

She didn’t understand why at the time, but one day Haruto tells her about his day. Every detail, every exciting moment, every boring one, and just everything, just like when they were little.

With such detail that she could almost see it.

 Haruto said it started with a very rude awakening.

 He’d been having a nightmare, there was green everywhere, fear, anger, and a lot of blood. Everyone was dead. All of the students, L-Elf, herself, all dead and it was his fault.

It was embarrassing for him, his fears, his guilt. Especially the guilt after everything he’d spouted about sharing and being equals.

He said there were bite marks on L-Elf’s neck and blood on his hands crawling its way up his arms.

L-Elf woke Haruto up, he was screaming in the worst way and the other boy had held him down by the shoulders, “It was a dream, Tokishima.”

Haruto could have sworn he saw something in the enemy agent’s eyes but it was gone as soon as it came. If he could put a name to it, he would have said it was concern.

“Get up. I want to go out.”

For all of L-Elf Karlstein’s genius level IQ, superhuman abilities, and experiences, he was like a child. By go out, he meant he wanted to explore every single nook and cranny of the module. Haruto mumbled an affirmative as he tried to calm his breathing and shaking.

He blinked and saw a flash of blood behind his eyes and his breathing sped up again. He tried to calm himself and he could have sworn he felt cool skin brush against his fingers. When he’d opened his eyes, L-Elf was casually pulling his pants on across the room.

Haruto rubbed his eyes and slipped out of bed and padded across the room.

He turned on the hot water and then picked his uniform off his desk chair and took the fastest shower he’d taken in a long time as it boiled. He was still shaking a little as the water came to a boil and he made them some coffee.

He normally left L-Elf to his own devices but Haruto had always needed to keep busy when he had nightmares. The nightmares were nothing new. Even when he and Shoko were kids his nightmares had always been disturbing. And that was with a life full of school and friends and everyday worries.

Add the Valvrave to all that and they became horrific.

Shoko knew this and she hadn’t even learned the worst parts about what Haruto had done, the murders he’d committed, that he wasn’t human anymore.

So he made them coffee.

He took his own dark, a pinch of milk, no sugar.

L-Elf’s with two teaspoons of sugar, and milk.

They drank it in a comfortable silence. The bitter taste and scalding heat of his coffee shook him out of his nightmare and jolted him fully awake. He felt L-Elf staring at the side of his head. He certainly wasn’t thinking about Haruto though.

Haruto thought that even the way he drank coffee was needlessly efficient.

He called it inefficient efficiency.

Once they’d finished their coffee, they left the cups and walked out of the room. Technically, Haruto was not on schedule to be L-Elf’s guard, but L-Elf couldn’t be handled by any of them and they all knew it.

So Haruto was his permanent guard. Unofficially, of course.

Still. They had to keep up appearances.

L-Elf led the way down to the fields.

“So. What are you planning today, L-Elf?”

There was a lot Shoko didn’t know about L-Elf. And a lot she came to not know about her best friend.

Like the fact that Haruto felt it was a personal goal to get under L-Elf’s skin. Merely because no one should be so calm and on top of things all the time, especially not with how their first meeting went. He wasn’t trying to make him  _angry_ or anything, because that was just asking for trouble. So he was trying to be an annoyance in the kindest way possible.

L-Elf draws.

Haruto was surprised, to say the least, when he said “No plans. Sit there and do your little guard job.”

He brushed a lock of brown hair behind his ear, feeling a little bit giddy at the insult.

Haruto thought he was different since abandoning his humanity in the Valvrave. Not the murder or the strange urges but something fundamental in him was…different.

He used to be passive. It wasn’t an ideal he had, he just was passive, he didn’t have a large drive for anything. Then all of a sudden he wanted to fight for things, do more than just let life happen around him and just let things happen to him.

He wanted to push buttons and see what happened. If something exploded, well Haruto would take care of that and make apologies when that happened.

All using his best and brightest judgment of course.

In other ways he was the same. He cared intensely about his friends, and he only wanted the best for them, and he didn’t want bad things to happen, nor did he want all the responsibility.

But still. He wanted things to make him feel alive.

Haruto obediently sat in the grass next to L-Elf and pulled out his phone, swiping at it aimlessly.

He freezes when L-Elf pulls a small leatherbound book out of his inner pocket, and with it a pencil, point rounded from obvious use.

Haruto hides his surprise, but not well enough.

L-Elf throws a glance his way, but doesn’t comment. His face says all the “Stupid mortal you are so far beneath me” that he would ever need to say with words.

He lays back in the grass, soothed by the sound of pencil against paper, a rare sound in these times, and looks up at the sky as a tension he didn’t know was within him slips away.

He thinks of the stars, glittering and shining and so far away, each one a sun burning hot and true and about to die. He thinks about how they are a far away star to someone else, far far away.

 

Shoko falls asleep thinking about the stars, warm in her pilot’s arms.

L-Elf lays on the cold metal floor, wide awake, thinking about grass against his back.

 

Haruto didn’t know quite when he’d managed to drift off, but he did, his phone slipping out of his hand and into the grass, his breath evening out, his body comfortably warm in the light.

It was then that L-Elf lets his hand stop moving against the paper.

He takes a deep breath and lets his shoulders relax and lets his spine curve.

He looks at the boy he picked to be his left hand. Naïve, short sighted, short tempered, but ridiculously kind. A walking weakness.

Which means no one will see him coming.

His revolution will succeed.

He will save her.

Before he realized what he was doing, he was drawing the other boy. His hair framed his face well as it fell against his cheek, and he looked beautifully relaxed as he slept. The grass waved slightly as his breath came out in soft puffs.

L-Elf sighed, he was prone to unpredictable actions when it came to Liselotte, whether he was thinking about her or interacting with her, even indirectly as he did.

It seemed it would be the same with Tokishima Haruto.

He would never say it to Haruto himself, before he died, but he liked the sound of his name, the color of his hair, the tones and fluctuations of his voice, and the emotions in his eyes. They were so unlike what he had known, what he had lived.

L-Elf didn’t get crushes, he didn’t like people. He hated crowds. People were stupid in crowds, there was romance in groupd, interaction let emotions flow and emotions led to romance. It all made people act stupid.

Society was flawed, there was so much wrong.

But he could appreciate the small rights, the little things.

Of course that didn’t mean he had to show it.

But it did mean he reacted a little differently when Haruto’s face twisted in discomfort in a way that made his experience in the morning seem calm.

L-Elf vaguely thought that maybe Haruto should have been talking to someone. With the way he had been dealing with it while they’d been rooming together, it didn’t seem like a new occurrence. A schoolboy’s worries with a soldier’s mind.

_What did I do to deserve this?_

He wasn’t sure if he’d meant the question in a bad or good way as he brushed Haruto’s hair away from his face and tucked some of the short locks behind his ear. He leaned closer to him and talked more softly than he had in the morning.

“It’s just a dream,” he hesitated, feeling unlike himself, “Haruto. You’re dreaming.”

He cupped a hand briefly against his cheek. He wasn’t certain he was doing anything helpful, and it wasn’t a comfortable feeling for him, being uncertain.

He looked at him and he thought of Liselotte. He thought of him when he thought of Liselotte. His thoughts come full circle. That at least makes sense. He’s not against feeling things, loving things, hating things, creating and destroying. But no one is careful with them, people just toss them around carelessly and then moments like this, where he is touching this boy and committing a simple act of human care, become lost and tossed into the wind, a drop in the ocean.

So he cherishes and loves in the ways he can, when no one is watching, where it won’t stir the waters or affect anyone.

That being said he’s not a well of emotion or anything, but he’s not an adult yet. None of them are.

He felt something wet run down his hand and it’s just a tear from Haruto’s eyes, unwilling, unconscious crying and L-Elf wipes it away. His breathing evens out soon after.

An hour later, Haruto blearily opened his eyes to find L-Elf laid out next to him, more relaxed than he’s ever seen him, and he’s seen the other boy deep asleep before. His eyes are closed and his arms are at rest to his sides.

His breath is soft and even and Haruto felt comfortably warm in the grass and for once, well rested.

Haruto quietly sat up and checked his phone for messages. None from anyone he knows and a lot from people he’s never met.

The world was so open and so secret.

Haruto felt a little bit lonely. He didn’t see his friends most of the time because none of them wanted to come into contact with L-Elf, and he was hiding so much from them. He felt very very lonely.

L-Elf stood up a moment later. Of course he wasn’t sleeping.

“Lunch.”

Right on time as usual.

They’d headed to the cafeteria to eat. As usual the place was a lot emptier than when they’d entered after about ten minutes.

It had been no secret where L-Elf had come from and that he’d likely been the cause of many deaths. They were all kids. Of course they’d avoid someone they considered a murderer or traitor or enemy. It wasn’t politics, it was just morals and ideals at work.

After lunch Haruto felt a strong urge to watch a movie. He used to love doing that a lot more, watching people live lives and do things that he couldn’t or just didn’t.

It felt a little bit weird just watching a movie with everything going on, but what else were you supposed to do with a free day.

It was one of those movies that people would see with a huge group of people about a girl idol from a terrible family.

Haruto was certain L-Elf would ditch him first chance as soon as the movie started, and frankly, he didn’t mind. It wasn’t as if they couldn’t handle themselves.

He’d found a classroom no one was using for any particular thing and set up the front screen. He told L-Elf that he was going to watch a movie and L-Elf told him in his own rather rude way that it was fucking obvious to say the least and did he look like his keeper.

So Haruto rather cheerfully hit play as he felt what he did from annoying the guy.

He glanced towards the corner he could have sworn L-Elf was just in and he was gone without a trace.

He sat down to enjoy the movie, he hoped that someone would wander in. It would happen sometimes and then they’d end up with an impromptu screening.

No one wandered in that day.

Though Haruto found himself embarrassingly invested in the film.

Towards the end he was humming along to the theme song. It was the climax of the film and there were guns on her during her debut performance.

“This is a ridiculous movie.”

Haruto jumped half out of his seat in fright, he didn’t even know he’d come back in. He hoped it was after the murder scene.

“W-well that’s the good part.”

He looked at Haruto like he was crazy and turned his eyes back to the viewscreen.

Haruto’s face was flushed and he wasn’t sure why so he just watched the movie. L-Elf just looked confused to himself as to why he’d even spoken about it. He wasn’t one for needless small talk.

They strolled out of the room, L-Elf leading the way. Three other students barreled towards them with a cart full of equipment. It all happened a bit fast but the gist of it was that a set of bound metal sheets flew off the cart towards Haruto. L-Elf got him out of the way in a movement so fast that it looked like he merely tripped, and the sheet landed squarely on his foot. He made a sound that would have been a scream of pain with anyone else as Haruto landed on the floor.

There was no other indication of pain as he looked towards Haruto on the floor and the shocked students. Haruto picked himself up rather sheepishly – and really L-Elf was surprised at how decent a liar he was – and helped them reload the cart.

It was lucky that the metal had landed flat on his foot rather than sharply as it would have if it had hit (impaled) Haruto.

They both noticed that they only apologized to Haruto for the scare and spared L-elf no words before taking off again at a more sedate speed to the lower levels of the module.

As soon as they were out of earshot Haruto rounded on L-Elf.

“What the hell do you think you were just doing?”

“Saving your life.”

“I can’t die! There’s nothing to save!”

The exclamation was like lighting a fuse.

“Nothing to save?! What do you think happens when they see what you’ve become?”

Haruto’s throat went dry and his hand twitched in warning of violence. L-Elf almost looked like he regretted the statement, but it wasn’t the worst he’d ever said.

In the end Haruto gave him a harsh, bittersweet smile, “You just don’t get it, do you, L-Elf?”

And L-Elf felt this wide gap between them, and really didn’t get it. Why was he mad that he’d turned what would have quickly been a huge incident into one with just minor injury to himself. He could live with the bruising. He’d been trained to work through much much worse.

Why did Haruto look like he felt sorry for him?

Haruto was just seeing the truth that the boy that was supposed to be some invincible super soldier had missed out in so much in life. There was a lot that L-Elf was more experienced and downright better than Haruto at, but when it came to social relationships, he was really underdeveloped.

He sighed and his smile softened, “Come on, let’s go back to our room.”

L-Elf acqueised.

He was tired of the whole of Module 77.

 

He was also tired of the shuttle.

He was tired of waiting but he knew his impatience and ignored it. He would take Haruto away to his unit when the time was right. And it would be soon. He just needed to get back there. It was the thought that shone brighter than anything else in his mind. Get back to the Valvrave, the key is there, Haruto is there. He could feel it.

He was laying in a storage room waiting to kidnap a corpse.

“This is ridiculous,” he said aloud to himself, letting his voice bounce off the walls just to hear it.

“But I guess that’s the good part,” and the words felt so unlike him that his stomach felt unsettled. There was no good part here, where did that idea even come from?

He sat up, brushing his hair behind his ears, but it merely fell forward again, and annoyed, he attempted it again before stopping mid-action the third time.

He never needed to do that with his hair because it stayed how he brushed it. It wasn’t a mess on his head, it just fell how he wanted it like an ode to his personality.

It was Haruto who had the messy hair that needed to be rearranged all day long.

To put it shortly, L-Elf never had such a habit.

Something was wrong with him, but he wasn’t sure because that meant something was wrong with his head and that can never be judged by oneself. He needed that for things. Important things, he was completely sure of that.

He manually opened the door, glancing down at the assortion of sweets and food left for him.

His head hurt.

He drank the glass of water, more quickly than he has ever drunken anything in hope that it will clear a little of the pounding in his head. Hoping it is partly from severe dehydration. He moves to wipe his mouth with his sleeve, but sees the blood on his sleeve.

What is wrong with him? All these unnecessary thoughts in his head, how is Saki doing, and how could he forget there was blood all over his sleeve.

He suddenly felt wrong in his own body.

He knew it wasn’t a panic attack, and he knew there was not physically sick aside from the headache that was quickly escalating into a migrane.

He grit his teeth in an action so like himself it shocked him back to the present. He knew exactly what was going on and Haruto didn’t need the Valvrave at all.

Haruto was alive.

He sprinted through the halls, assuming Shoko had not returned to the bridge from what she was capable of. Working in a group immediately after her oldest friend’s death was not something she was capable of.

He punched in an access code he didn’t know in order to gain access to her quarters. Empty. He went to Rukino Saki’s room, ready to question her on the leader’s whereabouts only to come face to face with a red eyed Shoko sitting next to Saki on her bed.

The bed and a few personal belongings were basically all that fit in the quarters anyway.

These unrelated thoughts, they were foreign to L-Elf’s mind and he was actually becoming panicked.

“Shoko,” that’s not what he called her, “ask me something only Haruto would know.” His voice was pleading, he rarely ever did that and the room was swimming before his eyes. Both girls looked shocked and worried and confused.

“W-what?”

“Anything. Do it,  _please_.”

“I..” she looked like she was about to cry again, “What…what did I tell Haruto after the first time.”

L-Elf gripped his head, it was worse, but he knew what she said and what she was speaking about, “After I…he climbed out of the Valvrave during the first attack, he said your shirt was really weird. He said he was going to use the bathroom. He wasn’t though he…”

L-Elf crumpled to the ground in pain, worse than anything he’d ever experienced or been trained to experience.

“L-Elf, what’s wrong, what is it?” Saki questioned him intently, as Shoko looked at him with wide eyes.

“Haruto’s not dead.”

The girls share a pain filled glance, thinking they knew he was, the body was enough evidence.

“No! He’s in here, I can feel him. I know things I shouldn’t, I’m thinking things that I don’t. Question me.”

Shoko looked at him intently, tears in her eyes, denial clear, but she asked him everything she could think of. There were unexplainable holes from a time L-Elf didn’t know, but it was things that he couldn’t possibly know.

L-Elf explained everything about the Valvraves to her. They had made a promise to unveil the world.

“Therefore, Sashinami Shoko, there is no other explanation. He had my body when it happened, and my runes and his own. His runes are in my head.”

He smiled a sharp smile through the pain.

“Tokishima Haruto is alive and he’s right here. I just need to get him back in his body.”

The ship was rocked by a strong tremor as the lights went out. Their bodies all went into fight mode as L-Elf cursed under his breath. They all ran into the corridor as the emergency lights came on bouncing red against the walls.

Saki immediately headed towards the ready room leaving Shoko and L-Elf to go to the bridge. His feet pounded against the floor and before he knew it the doors slid open before him and he was alone.

In the room with Haruto’s body. How had he gotten here?

Regardless, it was a good thing he hadn’t gone to the bridge, he had a strong suspicion (by which, he knew) that the students suspected him to be Haruto’s murderer. They only looked to him for help and to use him in dire situations. He couldn’t be angry, it is what he would have done in their place.

L-Elf felt like he couldn’t breathe and there was just a pressure in his head and chest. He lost strength in his legs and fell to the ground.

He dragged his way over to Haruto’s body, inch by inch by inch. He didn’t know what he was doing, just that he  _needed_ to be here, by Haruto’s side. The announcement was a proximity alert by an unknown ship. Enemy of course, because everyone was that until real treaties were signed and talks were held and all that wouldn’t happen until the Dorssian Revolution triumphed.

His head was spinning with all these thoughts of the future and the past and Haruto. His hands were shaking from pain as he picked his way onto the bed and sat on the cold body.

_He looks so peaceful._

_I don’t want to wake him up._

L-Elf almost laughed at his fevered thoughts as the pain lessened with the close proximity. He hunched over the body and leaned his head closer and closer until his lips brushed past soft hair and smooth skin until he lost himself and bit Haruto’s neck.

L-Elf saw bright green and starlight and life behind his eyes and then he was gone.

Interminable seconds passed and then Haruto’s body spasmed violently, almost tossing L-Elf from the bed. Haruto’s eyes opened slowly and immediately flicked towards the body on top of him.

He croaked out what sounded like L-Elf’s name. There was no response, the body was cold.

Panic set in and Haruto heard laughter in the back of his mind. It was strange, he recognized the laughter and the dead body on top of him but he didn’t know where they were or…he knew things but he felt so empty.

“L-Elf?” He had this unexplicable fear inside of him. If L-Elf was gone he had nothing, no one, no connection.

The surprisingly bright laughter came again and Haruto’s attention to the room faded away.

_Oh it all makes sense now. Haruto, calm yourself. You used my body so much that I changed a little bit._

_But what am I—_

_You are Tokishima Haruto. Do…do you remember me?_

_L-Elf Karlstein…_

_…Yes._

_…Michael._

A surprised feeling in the back of his mind, a feeling of too much emotion at once.

_Why can I hear you? Where are you?_

_I’m inside your head, obviously, Haruto._

_But your body is here. You feel d-dead._

_Tokishima Haruto. We’re friends, correct?_

_Yes. Of course._

_Then trust me. I’m real. I held what was left of you in my brain because you didn’t use up your last final memory. You made more before the end. I thought I would need the Valvrave for this but apparently your curse transferred as well._

_O..kay._

There was the equivalent of a mental frustrasted sigh.

  _Here, let me just.._

Haruto gasped as image after image and memory was given to him. L-Elf wasn’t feeding them to him like runes, he was showing them to him and in turn he was creating his own memories and sparking recognition in his mind.

And then he saw himself dying from L-Elf’s eyes.

And now he was here.

L-Elf shimmered brightly in the back of his mind giving Haruto time to ingest all that he had given him. He felt like snow and cold water on a hot summer’s day. It wasn’t uncomfortable, he liked having the other boy in his head. But he needed to get him back to his body.

“So I think I might like you. Love you maybe. I think.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome back, boy wonder.


	3. Starlight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Runes were a well researched topic, but not one that was widely known.

 

With an impressive amount of foresight, Haruto had managed to take all of the files that they could gain access to from the scientists’ lab in Dorssia.

As well researched as it was, a lot of the information was well placed speculations and theories veering on the edge of having enough proof for them to be true.

Everyone accumulates runes throughout their lifetime. Runes encompass genetics, memories, brain development, and everything one could think of. Each rune within a person does not hold one specific memory or function. Rather, the truth is that each rune holds a person’s entire legacy.

Runes were life itself.

When pushing runes into the Valvrave, there is only a certain amount taken and only a certain amount the body will allow to be taken before shutting down.

In theory, no one should die merely by letting a Valvrave run on their runes because most will pass out before the engine takes enough runes for there be danger of the brain shutting down.

If there is even one rune left in a human’s body, that single rune has all of the information and memories that the human body needs. In the case that there is only a single rune left, it would be notoriously difficult for the person to reawaken, as merely one rune is not enough for the body to function on.

It is also difficult to measure ‘how many’ runes a person has, as it is a completely subjective thing.

In the case of Marie, she had a lot of runes, but she could never stop leaking them, such as a person who is unable to clot, if they were to be cut they would bleed out with not too many ways to stop it aside from ‘not getting cut’.

With no way to stop her runes from super powering the Valvrave, Marie should never have been a pilot.

Haruto’s situation, however, was unique.

The reasoning for this is L-Elf Karlstein’s existence.

He allowed Haruto to only use his runes to power the Valvrave.

This made his runes familiarize and synchronize with Haruto’s.

He had his body taken over by Haruto a dangerous amount of times.

Therefore his mind was well adjusted to Haruto’s.

And not the least importantly, they spent a lot of time together which meant they shared experiences and memories of some of the most important parts of their lives.

With all of the body switching it was no surprise that some of their runes lingered the other’s mind.

With an empty body all that was left for the runes to be awakened, regardless of the body’s status it would regenerate. Only the spark of recognition within the mind was needed.

_But with us, our runes had mixed around so much that you woke up in my head while I was still in there, and now we’re both in here._

“And me with my memories coming back all weird. Did you know I once—“

_Focus._

“Sorry, but—“

_You can see every memory as it comes back. I know. I’m inside your head._

“Do you respond to all your love confessions by ordering them to carry a dead body and lecturing them on science,” Haruto snapped sulkily.

And there was that hopeful _scaredhappyhe’salive_ spark resting comfortably at the back of his head again.

_Focus._

“Michael,” Haruto whined.

_Don’t worry. You’ll be embarrassed once you’re yourself again._

“But I am me!”

He continued because he was starting to feel weird talking to L-Elf aloud.

_And that aside aren’t you being really, um, flippant right now? Kind of not like you, are you sure you’re okay up there?_

L-Elf sent him the mental equivalent of a shove to ‘get the hell on with it’ and a look that said they’d talk later.

“Must be nice,” _all you have to do is sit there in my head and I do all the hard work. And what’s with the red alert?_

_Now you ask? It’s nothing dangerous. Just a proximity alert. They won’t truly attack us, not now—hide!_

Haruto ducked around the corner, into a closet, trusting L-Elf implicitly, because he didn’t doubt that he could use his body’s senses better than he could.

The lights went back to normal, and power was restored as a trio of students walked down the hallway.

The shuttle itself was small, containing about ten extremely small personal rooms, a large communal sleeping area, a medical bay, engineering, the bridge, and a docking bay.

Apprently big enough to take one’s time carrying a body though.

_Do you ever stop thinking? Oh wait, I remember that now, the answer is no. Don’t scowl at me like that I’m doing a good—_

Haruto cut off mid thought as he was assaulted by a particularly strong memory.

It was of when he met his father in the labs during that terrible mission. L-Elf hadn’t known about this at all, what a pathetic man. He had never found himself holding such anger towards a person like he was then. It felt hot and tight within Haruto’s mind and he made vague reassurances that he had gotten past it and to calm down. And when did he ever get to tell L-Elf that?

But then another memory hit. A strange one that he couldn’t…well he couldn’t remember _remembering_ it.

He almost dropped L-Elf’s body at the force of it before opening the door to the docking bay. He quickly floated them into the Valvrave and they floated gently to the floor as it activated. Pino gasped, “Haruto! You’re back!” L-Elf was saying something to him, comforting he thought. Well it felt comforting as the memory bubbled to the surface. Something in Haruto was scared and angry towards this memory.

He let himself curl up on the floor for a moment mumbling negatives to himself as it came back to him.

It was before he went to Module 77. He was in a white room, he had no idea how he’d gotten there, he woke with his thin arms tied to a chair and the rest of him attached to some type of machine with liquid the same green as runes flowing through them.

He could hear L-Elf calling his name in the distance, the memory wasn’t like the others. Apparently he had pushed it so far away from himself that even all this couldn’t pull it out from the depths of his mind, not completely.

Next he knew he had been screaming in pain as his father told him not to worry that it would be okay, that papa was sorry for causing him pain. He had been crying, with no clue what was going on as he struggled away from his father and the two assistants. They held him down. They had wanted to see what would happen to the boy as they fed him runes and injected him with a suppressant so he would never know it had happened.

Similar memories swirled around that one, but none of them clear. Haruto’s stomach roiled as he curled up into a tighter ball, ignoring L-Elf’s mental shouting of his name and focusing on the feel of him inside of his head.

_Haruto?_

He could feel L-Elf’s fury.

Haruto felt tears prickle at the edge of his eyes, of course L-Elf had seen the memory as well and wondered if he’d known about it before hand, but his answer came in an offended and shocked feeling from L-Elf.

Yes, he had never been human in the first place, he’d do well to remember that and he needed to get L-Elf out of his head before something bad happened to him too.

_Haruto, you idiot!_

He winced at the other’s anger.

_Sorry._

L-Elf made a frustrated noise and surprised Haruto by cursing. He supposed it made sense that the other boy was much less controlled inside his own mind than he was on the outside.

_I am always in control._

Haruto laughed aloud a little hysterically, trying to get a hold of himself, letting the ghost of L-Elf inside of his head run his hands through his hair.

“Pino? We need your help...”

“You’re alive! How? Your runes were out in space!”

Haruto blinked in surprise when another boy showed up on screen pointing at L-Elf, “It was him. He was weak like all the others,” L-Elf bristled at this, “but he’s different now, stronger. More like us. More like the Magius.”

“Who are you?”

“This is Prue!”

The boy sheepishly continues, “I was in Cain’s Valvrave.”

“Oh..Not that I don’t care but, is there any way for us to get back to our correct bodies?”

“…Yes,” Prue answers a little bit warily, as Pino nods happily next to him. They really would have to investigate that, and maybe even getting them out. If they could be released then there were two more powerful allies on their side.

Saki and Akira had kept their suits on, as an emergency could arise again at any moment. They exited the room together, Saki talking, “Good thing it wasn’t a real emergency!”

Akira nods quietly, not truly wanting to get into a conversation with the intimidating girl.

Saki floats gently to a stop at the corner of the hallway, “I..um, I think I’m going to go visit Haruto, I..”

She looks distraught and Akira would do something but she’s not in the habit of comforting others nor will she really feel like it until she hears some sort of apology or comment from Shoko.

Aside from being distraught Saki also looked like she was up to something, or something was happening already. Akira may not have been as observant as L-Elf but watching the students day in and day out guarding herself socially and emotionally all the time, it’s a skill that’s difficult not to pick up within the circumstances.

“Okay.”

Rukino Saki says nothing as Akira follows her to the medical bay, only to find it mysteriously empty. Or given the look on Saki’s face – much more controlled than she’d expect – not so mysterious.

“W-what’s going on, Rukino Saki!”

No one else needs to know that she’d also been watching L-Elf and learning what it took to be taken seriously.

She ignored the tears in the idol’s eyes, “Where is Haruto!”

Saki covered her face with one hand, presumably to hide emotion, but a truly ineffective tactic because it drew notice to the emotion. It was definitely better to show your weakness because then no one will recognize your strengths. Well aside from the special people like Shoko and Haruto.

“Alive.”

“L-liar, I saw him, I helped…”

“He’s alive. J-just.” Saki took a deep breath and she removed her hand revealing a wild, pained smile, “Akira, would you follow me for a little while?”

After a long moment of staring Akira acquiesced and decided she would ask later when she’d given the girl permission for such casual use of her name.

L-Elf was not loud or anything in Haruto’s head. Even though Haruto had made fun of him, it had always been his habit to get under his skin. Both of their habits if either of them were being honest.

“So how do we do this?”

“You don’t do anything human, you just have to pilot.”

Haruto sat in the seat, ignoring L-Elf’s vague fear and denial of him piloting anything ever again. Haruto knew the thoughts were instinctual and illogical otherwise L-Elf would be vocalizing them.

“I’m not human.”

Prue gave him an unreadable look, “No I don’t think you are.”

Haruto hadn’t felt weak before but he felt more himself inside the Valvrave. Not that he hadn’t been himself before but parts of himself that were missing felt closer even if he didn’t know what they were.

“How?” Haruto asked, but his hands were moving to the controls on auto-pilot, and he was a little amazed that he somehow knew. He didn’t remember how to pilot yet his body did.

 _Wait._ There was a long pause as though L-Elf had not meant to think that at him. _Is this safe?_

Haruto shrugged, “Is this safe? Didn’t I just die because of this?” L-Elf flinched at that statement but stayed quiet.

He was in an uncomfortable position. It was definitely Haruto, but it was Haruto with memories of his memories and L-Elf’s emotional attachment to them which was not the same as what Haruto felt about things.

“It’s fine, you’re not firing weapons or anything. Just fully powering up.”

“Wow, how’d you know so much big brother?”

It was noted that Prue looked sullen and sad and morose. Important details for later.

“…Cain explained it to me when he awakened me. He explained a lot. He lied too.”

L-Elf for one, still felt off about it. He could feel bile rising in his throat at remembering waking up, not knowing what had happened to Haruto and turning around to find his friend blank eyed and fading away. He could feel the pain in his chest. He wanted it to go away and it wouldn’t until he could see Haruto through his own eyes.

Haruto made a small noise of distress. It seems he really did feel what L-Elf did if it was strong enough.

_Michael…_

L-Elf didn’t reply as he struggled to get himself under control. Difficult when one was only their own mind. So he did them both a favor and tried to think less. If it worked it would be a miracle and if something went wrong, they would deal with it. L-Elf just knew they needed Haruto to get through this war. He needed Haruto.

_You’re really bad at not thinking. You always…_

Haruto trailed off, unable to vocalize his thoughts. There were still holes in Haruto’s memory, things that just weren’t there because he didn’t know that they were missing. But there were logical ends to this.

_How did we meet?_

_I killed you._

Haruto laughed nervously, and Prue and Pino shared a look with each other. He had a vague feeling they could hear their mental conversation.

_No._

_I stabbed you in the chest and shot you. Then you stole my body and shot my partner._

The words resonated within Haruto and he knew they were true as the memories came back to him. A silver haired boy who changed his life and their partnership. Haruto searching frantically for the other boy in too much empty space. Picking him up in the Valvrave and realizing the extent of his partner’s plans and seeing the desperation within him.

_Oh. Okay. I think we should just get on with this before I ask anymore questions involving me dying—sorry, sorry Michael I didn’t mean to die? I don’t remember…_

_Idiot. Does it feel like anything’s wrong with me? Get on with it._

_You seem…_

Haruto had a pained look on his face. Pino looked like she wanted to laugh but was making a show of holding back. He knew exactly how L-Elf would take this.

_Distressed. And panicked. It’s okay you know? I don’t remember anything completely. Well I remember things now thanks to you, but not everything, but I always remembered you._

_Now that you’ve mangled the language, go ahead and pilot._

Haruto bit his lip and rolled his eyes, this is what he gets for confessing his clearest and dearly remembered emotions to L-Elf.

He brushed some brown hair behind his ears and got to work.

“Alright, now Pino can bring you into the engine. I’ll help.”

“The engine?”

“It’s a rune processer. That way his runes will be able to be sent back to his body. You’ll be running in reverse.”

“What about me?”

“We’ll see. You can’t both stay in the same body though. You’ll become one eventually and not a mix. Whoever’s strongest.”

Haruto considered just letting L-Elf take his body but L-Elf practically attacked him at the thought. It was weird getting punched inside of your own head. He thought it would hurt physically but it just felt like a lot of feelings. Anger and hurt and pain.

_Do it. Right. Now._

Shortly, L-Elf was pissed at him.

So he turned the Valvrave on and out of standby mode and felt the system access his mind.

It felt like home.

And then suddenly he was in this empty white space, sparkling, and bright with stars like space, but comfortable and safe.

\---

Akira and Saki froze upon entering the hangar and finding Haruto’s Valvrave active.

Akira shook her head in denial for a moment before stopping. Saki moved towards it, knocking on the front opening with no response.

Suddenly Shoko was behind both of them, “Is it L-Elf in there?”

Saki gave her an intense look before she got it.

“H-haruto?” She looked very small and very strong in that moment. Saki nodded an affirmative as Akira and Shoko came towards her.

Shoko laid a hand on the glass, “He’s really alive? I thought..” She thought L-Elf had lost it in  really elaborate lie. She was surprised Saki had believed all that, but she was part of it too after all. It seems everyone knew more about the whole thing than her.

To her credit the whole situation was very far-fetched to come into.

But still. Shoko was more than a little bit angry. She was supposed to be the esteemed Prime Minister of their country and yet there she was, kept in the dark and _protected_. She hated it. She didn’t think she could forgive either of them for the sheer enormity of the lies they told. Or the truths they withheld. She was also very upset over the fact that she’d thought Haruto _dead_ and there he was gallivanting around with L-Elf.

She could scream from how ignorant she felt over the whole situation and was about to do just that but ended up letting out a startled noise instead as Unit 01 suddenly emitted a low glow.

It looked like starlight.

\--

Haruto was floating in a pool of emptiness. There were voices. Three of them.

Who is it?

He felt silver light and blue flames wrapped around him.

_Michael.._

There was a small but bright smile

_Will you ever pronounce my name right, Haruto?_

_Ma..Mikhail._

Haruto’s world came back to him in sharp clarity. Right. He was inside the Valvrave. His face would have been bright red if he was aware of his body, he cursed L-Elf and his _emotions_.

“Tokishima Haruto, it is time to remember. You can’t stay here,” Prue floated in front of him, body visible, holding Haruto and L-Elf’s shining runes before him.

_Prue, was it? How do I remember if I don’t know what I’m supposed to remember?_

_“_ That’s why he brought you here!” Pino practically danced into the light and pouted, “This is where they trapped me. Home.”

Prue looked sullen, “I’m only helping because my sister says she trusts you and… I want revenge.”

No one asked who the revenge was against.

“If you focus on yourself, you can be in a body too.”

Haruto tried to focus but he couldn’t, all he felt was spinning and a vague impression of stretching. So of course he could see L-Elf immediately come into focus next to him. He smirked in triumph as Haruto struggled. But it was more than that, L-Elf was all intent as his gaze bored into Haruto’s very being. His hand reached towards Haruto’s bright light, what amounted to his runes, his broken soul.

And then suddenly Haruto was there. He blinked down in confusion at his hands and the rest of him. He was glowing green. For that matter, so was L-Elf and the light stretched between them.

They were connected. Sure it was by runes but for some reason the vision touched Haruto and from the look in L-Elf’s eyes it had affected him too.

“So since this prison of ours is running in reverse, I will reorganize your runes,” L-Elf wanted to ask why he was doing this for them, how would it help when it would be easier for them to let all the pilots and the humans just die. But the look in the Magius’ eyes reminded him of Haruto at his most determined and he decided it was safer not to question it. Prue would help them and that is all he needed.

“Pino will help too. She knows you both much better than I.”

There was such a thing as too many answers so he nodded and moved closer to Haruto’s side.

Haruto looked on the edge of something. An emotion unnamed to L-Elf but powerful in its own right so he slid his hand around Haruto’s wrist hoping it wasn’t wrong of him to do so. This was such unnamed territory to him. He didn’t have the time with Liselotte, and Haruto could be so different and surprising.

Haruto’s lip trembled when he felt L-Elf’s touch and he slid their hands together, intertwining their fingers and effectively trapping L-Elf’s hand in his own.

Prue began and he felt like L-Elf was being ripped away from Haruto even though he was right there. He instinctually rebelled against it, his mind clinging to Haruto’s like a lifeline before it all went dark.

L-Elf couldn’t breathe.

He had been allowed to stay in a room when Haruto picked him up in space, low on oxygen and about to pass out. It was the day they’d made their contract.

There was a thickness in his throat as he reconsidered the other boy.

Haruto had jumped into the fray in a futile attempt to delay Cain from killing L-Elf. He knew the other couldn’t die but his heart rose in his throat as he got away from his old teacher, now known Magius.

His breath came in fast dizzying puffs when Haruto told him that he would be waiting for him, that he would take care of him and Liselotte was dead and there had been nothing he could do to change that.

His heart stopped and his breath came in slowly, burning with every inhale and hurting him on every exhale as he looked down at Haruto’s dead unrecognizing eyes as he slipped away.

Nothing was like the moment L-Elf experienced then, his life passing before his eyes as his runes were rearranged one by one, he relived every happy moment alongside every death, agony, and pain he’d suffered over and over.

Throats were slit, he had methodically severed a person’s limbs, his parents had been killed, he killed, he couldn’t save her. He couldn’t save any of them.

Haruto died again and again and again.

There was screaming and hands pulling painfully on his hair as if intending to rip them out. They lessened when there was a mostly unfamiliar voice telling him he would survive – Prue. He would survive being put back in his own body, the pain was proof he’d survived much worse, so he allowed it.

He repeated two names in his head like a prayer.

Liselotte.

Haruto.

Liselotte. Haruto.

His lights.

It did nothing as the memories came again, assaulting his mind, and he only saw green green light. He screamed and there were nails against his throat this time.

\---

The girls whipped towards the Valvrave at the horrific sounds.

“What is that?”

Akira covered her ears. She hadn’t been trained for this, she didn’t want to hear any more pain.

“What’s happening in there?”

“L-Elf! Haruto!”

\---

“Prue! What’s happening to him!?”

Haruto’s voice. He recognized it and the hands against his throat stopped. He let out a cough as oxygen came back to him.

He realized that the hands were his own, there was blood underneath his fingernails and a stray strand of silver hair floated in front of him. A scream ripped from his throat of its own accord and he covered his mouth.

_What a pitiful state. I’m still weak._

His hands were shaking from the extent of the ordeal but he was back in his own body. He felt Haruto in front of him and alive but L-Elf focused on calming the shaking and breathing and he couldn’t.

He couldn’t do it, he really didn’t know what to do. His mind was clearing but everything still felt off, he felt different but that didn’t matter.

“Haruto, are you…do you remember?”

L-Elf recognized his entire state as panic, a thing he thought he’d grown out of long ago.

He allowed Haruto to pry his hands off his face and he was rewarded with a bright and slightly bitter smile.

Haruto knew what he needed to hear, “I remember you. I remember everything. It’s…weird, I remember things that are related, but before our module…there’s a lot of holes.”

_Of course there would be, of course he couldn’t come out of this without damage with so many runes taken._

If things were mostly okay, then why wouldn’t his limbs stop trembling. It wasn’t as bad as other things, except it was as bad as every single terrible blood-stained thing he’d ever lived through.

His fingers twitched in Haruto’s grip and he allowed the tears to come as he so rarely did.

He showed himself to Haruto.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry! This chapter is shorter than I'd usually make it, but don't worry, it's made up for in the next chapter. I try to remind myself that the goal is something to smoothly insert between the end of the series and the future that we see but I forget in my campaign to put these boys through painful situations so they can comfort each other.
> 
> tl;dr there will be less suffering soon. this fic is working towards a semi-happy ending.


	4. Storm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> L-Elf was calm. Haruto was also oddly calm.

L-Elf took three long minutes to calm down. Haruto spoke to him quickly, telling him what he remembered, that he remembered school, he remembered them, he remembered the important things, that the Magius were ruling them, and that L-Elf liked sweets, and that Shoko was his oldest friend except he couldn’t remember the old part, and that Saki confused him. He remembered who died. He kept talking even though the only indication that he was listening was the returning pressure of L-elf’s hands in his own.

L-Elf breathed in and out. There was no immediate danger. They were safe for the moment. He’d done the impossible yet again and gotten Tokishima Haruto back. They were not human.

At least that’s what he tried to tell himself.

By the time the first minute passed he’d only managed to calm his instinct to flee the Valvrave. He opened his eyes to Haruto’s face closer than he’d expected, saying something about a bond and that he was scaring him he was supposed to be the calm one. He thought that the feelings he felt then were an indicator that he was alive. Not that he was breathing or that his heart was beating or that he could move his limbs and sleep and awaken, but that he was consciously alive.

He thought Haruto was alive too and it was a great thing.

By the end of the second minute he’d calmed his rapid thoughts and the pressure that had been building within him since before their battle with Cain.

He hadn’t seen Haruto look so worried about him in what seemed like years. He was the only one who generally gave him that look. Being worried about him instead of worried about what he’d cause.

At the end of the third minute he removed his hands from Haruto’s, startling him.

L-Elf felt oddly calm. It made sense after a release of emotion, but not after once so intense and of the kind he hadn’t experienced since his early days of Karlstein.

Haruto had said that he thought he loved him. Maybe.

L-Elf recognized what he was feeling. It was the same as when Sashinami Shoko shortened his planned and declared them an independent state by holding the Valvrave hostage.

Awe. Surprise. Excitement. Adoration.

Haruto looked at him with the same eyes that he looked at her and his friends at the time. So L-Elf accepted the fact of Haruto’s love.

“Yes.”

Haruto was obviously confused. He was never good at following when L-Elf made leaps of thought in seconds.

“I—yes? What?”

“You do.”

Haruto didn’t even answer at that point, choosing to look at L-Elf with a blank expression.

_I…what? But the look on Mikhail’s face…I want to kiss him…_

Haruto’s lips fell apart a millimeter when L-Elf’s hand brushed against his cheek into his hair. L-Elf’s expression looked like he was making fun of Haruto yet it managed to be a pure and soft expression.

The moment was perfect, Haruto could just lean in and-

“There are at least two people in the hangar by now. I’m supposed to be locked in a closet. You’re supposed to be dead. We’re some type of pseudo-Magius.”

Haruto desperately reminded himself that he was in love with this one-track minded guy as he attempted to say something.

Before he knew it L-Elf managed to make himself look impeccable in moments and had pressed the button to open the cockpit.

The Valvrave moved into its standby position and the cockpit hissed open.

It was quiet.

The girls glanced up at the sound and all immediately saw Haruto - notably _alive_. Shoko instinctively reached out towards him, raising her hand an inch before stopping the motion in favor of running towards her friend as he climbed out of Hito, with L-Elf at his side.

She leapt towards him, embracing him in relief. And it was finally safe to do so, to show him that she was sorry that she loved him that she was glad he was okay.

She didn’t notice L-Elf stiffen slightly at their side as she touched Haruto.

She did remember what he said though. What runes were and how the Valvraves worked and what had been going on behind her back. She was angry about that and a lot of things. But above all she was happy to see Haruto unharmed.

Saki came to a stop nearby, but surprisingly made no moves towards Haruto. She instead chose to greet L-Elf quietly. Haruto took note of this.

Akira watched from the side.

The hacker was amazed at how easily they could all hide their discomfort. She wanted to be love and be loved to that extent someday. But then she thought of her brother, how he treated her, and Shoko and how she treated the girl who brought her into the light and she was at peace.

“Haru…Haruto…do you remember me?”

“Of course I do Shoko.”

Shoko smiled tearfully and apologetically and proceeded to slap Haruto rather hard in the face. L-Elf immediately moved forward.

“OW! What the hell was that for?!”

She slapped him again and he made a surprised sound as he cradled his face – which was already healing the light bruise.

“For making me think you were dead! And for lying to me”

She swiveled threateningly towards L-Elf. He was surprised that the girl would even attempt violence toward him. It was natural for him to not allow anyone to harm him but was it a social norm to allow it? He wasn’t certain. He never was the type for all this.

But L-Elf didn’t get slapped at all. Shoko did the boldest thing possible and messed L-Elf’s hair up for an extremely long moment, “How dare you make me think you were going insane, L-Elf!”

Saki, laughing so hard she was almost in tears, hugged both boys lightly and quickly before moving Shoko away, “Are you trying to get yourself hurt here, Prime Minister?”

Shoko was still smiling but she was starting to tear up. She turned away to wipe her tears.

L-Elf didn’t let his expression change from mildly disinterested throughout the entire exchange. He supposed they had picked their government well.

He felt a hand slide into his hair and he leaned into it minutely as it pushed the strands back into place brushing knuckles down his neck its path out.

“You look surprised at the welcome, Michael,” Haruto whispered.

“I’m never surprised, but if it helps you sleep at night,” L-Elf trailed off

Haruto laughed brightly, startling everyone and causing them to turn their eyes on him.

Saki and Shoko glanced at each other and grinned, “It’s been a long time since we’ve heard that!”

Shoko just laughed as Haruto turned his eyes away from them, only to look at L-Elf before deciding an unnamed piece of wall would be a better target.

“Oh, I think he’s embarrassed!” Shoko said in good humor. Akira texted her a flurry of messages to that comment, with Saki peeking over her shoulder.

The girls were laughing uncontrollably in seconds.

“You look embarrassed, Haruto,” L-Elf spoke quietly to him.

“Shut up,” Haruto muttered.

Eventually they made their way back into the ship, deciding that it was best for Haruto and L-Elf to stay away from the others in one of the rooms to avoid any unnecessary conflict until they returned to Module 77. The ship had sustained heavy damage throughout the mission and it would take approximately 8 hours to return with the speed they could attain.

“I’m going to lock you in. I know you can get out if you really need to, so this is more for your own safety than any sort of punishment.”

She hugged Haruto closely before leaving.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered to Haruto, “I’m sorry I did that. Please can we talk later?”

Haruto nodded and gave Shoko a smile before they left. Saki and Akira shot them both a look as the door closed.

There was a lot of talking to be done with all of them.

The door closed leaving the two boys in a small ten by eight square foot room with an even smaller bed.

“We have to talk too don’t we. About what we are.” Haruto sat at the edge of the bed.

L-Elf, still standing, glanced down at Haruto. He looked extremely distant.

If he were another person, he would have hugged him.

“What are you thinking about?”

“The Valvraves. My father. The people I killed. My d-dead friends.”

“Ha—“

“What did I do, why do I deserve this? I’d never tried to destroy anything but I don’t Michael, I don’t remember before, who was I before that. Mikhail what did I do, why did they all have to die, why couldn’t I just—“

Haruto continued to mumble disconnected sentences, talking both to himself and L-Elf at the same time, his breathing heavy with choked sobs, yet no tears came.

L-Elf looked at his friend, a little horrified. He couldn’t imagine feeling all that. He knew when he did things wrong, when he did them right and all that was left was to not do the incorrect things in the future. There was nothing more anyone could do.

He was unsure as whether to touching him was the correct thing to do. He was always unsure when it came to his Haruto.

But the choice was taken away from him when Haruto slowly but desperately wrapped his arms around his middle and dragged him down onto his lap on the small bed. L-Elf let him.

He ran a hand through Haruto’s hair and eventually he felt a few small tears soak his shoulder. Tears for those who died and the unfortunate who lived.

He maneuvered them so they were both snugly on the bed. L-Elf didn’t take his eyes off the other boy once. He had the vague belief that he’d developed an irrational fear about the boy dying on him. Perhaps not so irrational with the words he’d been spewing.

“Did you feel better when you did this in the Valvrave?” He gestured to himself, indicating his distressed state.

L-Elf didn’t answer. Rhetorical, he thought.

“Because I don’t.”

Haruto ducked his head and moved bravely closer to L-Elf, giving silent permission for L-Elf to do what amounted to petting him.

He did just that and L-Elf thought that maybe he was obeying Haruto a little bit too easily because of his irrational yet necessary feelings for him.

Haruto brushed his hands against L-Elf’s throat and he felt a twinge of pain there. He’d forgotten about those. He lightly moved Haruto’s hands away from them but Haruto gripped his in the process.

“I don’t think you did either.” Haruto looked a little embarrassed but continued onwards, “Don’t do that again.”

He sounded extremely tired.

“Go to sleep.” The words were intended as an order, but the words came out of L-Elf’s mouth more softly than he intended, “We have a lot to do when this shuttle lands.”

Haruto was out cold before he even finished talking.

L-Elf couldn’t sleep. It’s not that he was unused to sleeping in a room with Haruto or even under such close conditions. He just didn’t feel tired.

He closed his eyes.

Two hours later the room to their room unlocked, and someone walked in with a gasp upon seeing them.

L-Elf kept his body loose and ready to move at a moment’s notice. He didn’t recognize the footsteps or their breathing and he safely assumed it was someone who meant him (them) harm.

He knew that not all the students were broken by Haruto’s death and a great number did not agree with Shoko’s decision to allow the ‘monsters’ back with them. It is why he agreed with her decision to let them stay out of sight from the other students until they got home.

They could know of their presence but it was best not to rub their faces in it.

Feet shifted nervously against a floor and there was the sound of metal sliding clumsily against fabric. Haruto’s breathing changed, he was awake. He didn’t move either so he knew that the other boy was aware.

They were both certain any motion would cause the student to shoot one of them. L-Elf swiftly stood from the bed aiming the gun at the student before they could take the safety off and stopped them in their tracks.

“What do you think you’re doing.”

“Y-you’re traitors, you monsters!”

Haruto moved faster than anyone thought possible and had the student pressed against the wall. L-Elf couldn’t see his face but whatever the student saw scared him and he fought wildly to get out.

“We’re not monsters. You just tried to shoot two defenseless people.”

He managed an incredulous face at ‘defenseless’ and looked around for help that would never come for him. L-Elf gave a small smile, scaring him further.

“Perhaps you should leave,” L-Elf said flatly.

Haruto let him go, taking his gun and rolling his eyes.

The student fell in his haste to get out and stumbled out the door, his steps pounding down the hallway.

“Maybe we’d be safer on the bridge,” Haruto said flippantly.

“Yes, let’s go.”

Haruto was going to point out that he’d been joking but he settled for messing his hair and fixing his sleep rumpled clothes.

Haruto could’ve sworn he heard laughter as L-Elf left the room, expertly undoing the lock mechanism. It hit him that the student was smart enough to break the lock but not enough to see them as allies and not…monsters.

He followed L-Elf out.

\---

There was an undeniable tension in the student body.

What those on the bridge knew was that Haruto was dead and L-Elf had brought him back that way. Some thought he was the culprit since there was no trace of the other pilots and the Dorssian was seemingly uninjured.

Others didn’t care who had murdered Haruto because they blamed the so-called monsters for their current predicament.

A precious few believed that Haruto had been killed in the line of duty and L-Elf had come back _tragically_ unharmed, though even fewer cared that L-Elf had survived and only felt grief over their classmate.

There were also the rumors that they were lying again, and that Haruto was alive because they’d seen him get shot in the heart and come back to life. There were no wounds on him so he was obviously alive and still a threat. That Sashinami Shoko was in league with the non-humans. That they were in a no win scenario and were trapped no matter which way they turned.

It was the beginnings of a very xenophobic society and that was something none of them should want.

Shoko took a deep breath from her seat. Nanami, the only non-militant professor, was correct. Everyone just needed to talk.

Though that was quite obviously easier said than done when everyone would rather kill or shoot at the problem.

She was amused as she remembered the various ways L-Elf had gone about things. He was a prime example of ‘shooting the problem’. Though his reasoning was far more logical than most it didn’t make it completely correct.

She wondered exactly why she was needed on the bridge. There was nothing happening and she would be much better served making diplomatic calls but she could also feel the student’s fear. Likely a combination of the confusion L-Elf and Haruto always tend to cause, and all the death and battle they’d seen in such a short span of time.

She couldn’t wait to get home. The ride had been mostly smooth and she could see the module in the distant space. She wanted to ask if their arrival time had changed at all but she didn’t want to sound like a little kid.

“What’s our current ETA?”

All those simulation classes back when they were actually in school really had sunk in. They were lucky.

“With our current speed and trajectory, four hours—“

The girl who had turned towards her cut off mid sentence as the door behind her opened. She felt a preemptive sense of exasperation before she turned around, warily.

 _Please don’t let it be the boys_.

She turned around.

The next few minutes were a blur of yelling and accusations directed wildly towards herself, Haruto, L-Elf and unrelated other students.

The three looked at each other quietly as the noise continued. She assumed they had a reason for leaving their rooms and where they were was the safest location, rather than being alone again, if anything happened.

They were still going to talk about this. Shoko liked the talking idea a lot. It got problems solved quickly and with less pain for both parties.

She stood and tugged her shirt down and looked around sternly at her citizens. They noticed her expression and quieted.

“ _Prime Minister!”_ a voice begged for an explanation.

“Okay, I know you’re all confused and angry and upset. We…we’ve suffered enough but could I please ask you to wait until we get to the module to attempt to overthrow me again, or try to kill anyone, or spread any rumors? That way I can explain the truth that I discovered to all of you, all at the same time?”

“You know something?”

“Don’t worry, I only found out about an hour or two ago,” she remarked flatly, toned towards the boys, “In any case, please, I’m begging you as my friend, let me give you the truth in a way you all deserve when we get home safely?”

She got grudging nods and agreements in response.

Everyone was tired.

She motioned for Haruto and L-Elf to sit somewhere, anywhere, and stay out of the way. They both rolled their eyes, and she almost giggled at how in sync they were, how different they were from when this all started. At least _they_ listened to her.

She frowned as the distraction went away and she could think about all the lives they’d just lost, some in her own arms. She wondered what Akira was doing.

Three excruciating hours later, they entered the module. Everyone was directed to go eat and sleep and do whatever they needed to do in the dorms. The school building was not to be entered, it needed to be cleaned, and that there was going to be an assembly in ten hours.

As the students trudged off, the surviving pilots and their cohorts all gathered, heading for one of the activity rooms they tended to use. They needed to talk. Perhaps even get stories straight if lying was necessary.

They took their usual seats and automatically looked at L-Elf for an explanation.

He had made the decision to explain all the details they knew of the Valvraves and runes and the Magius and the fact that all the students were modified humans. It wouldn’t do for them not to know when the rest of humanity knew about it.

So it was even better for them to have accurate facts.

By the end of the explanations and questioning everyone looked exhausted.

“So what do we tell the students? That they’re all monsters?” Takami spat the last word out as though it burned.

Akira, who had been mostly quiet through the explanations, in her corner of the room, spoke up.

“I think…I think we should. They’re stupid for acting as though what we are should affect how they treat us, so let them deal with it!”

Shoko gripped the edge of her skirt tightly.

Saki agreed, “They tried to kill us. We saved them. They deserve no more and no less than the cruel truth.”

Shoko pursed her lips as L-Elf continued, “There’s one more thing.” She felt nervous as she saw Haruto dart a panicked glance towards L-Elf, “Mi—“

“Tokishima Haruto and myself aren’t the same type of non-humans as you.”

Haruto felt a strong burst of fear that L-Elf would tell them what his father had done to him, but a sharp glance from him stopped him from speaking up as he normally would have.

“I spoke with the Magius in the Valvrave and apparently use of runes _outside_ the Valvraves is special and indicates a completely different genetic make up than what you have. I would have kept this secret but it’s always better for a small group to know a state secret, just like before. If it gets out you can manage the PR damage.”

They took a moment to take that in.

L-Elf took a deep breath to center himself as remembered how exactly he had come to this point. All the times Haruto had fed off him. He shivered in a way that couldn’t be seen yet Haruto was looking at him questioningly. He looked at Haruto and quickly refocused his attention on the rest of the room.

_Michael?_

L-Elf almost jumped at hearing the voice in his head. A lesser man would have. He restrained himself to cursing lowly in his head.

 _You’re still in my head. How. And say my name_ correctly.

_You probably didn’t notice me telling you when we were with Pino and Prue. He said the link couldn’t be severed completely. Um…with how…how..closely bonded we were. He said that it is how Magius bond and.._

“Wait, I don’t understand what you mean. And did you say _both of you?_ I thought you said the students were the only ones who—“

_Oh._

Haruto looked like he was holding back laughter, _Are you embarrassed?_

“You don’t need to understand. Just know that we’re different. Closer to Magius. That’s all you need to know, unless you want to know _more_ dangerous information.”

_I don’t do that._

_You are, your ears are red._

Shoko sensed a fight, but surprisingly not between Takami and L-Elf but the latter and Haruto. L-Elf always grit his teeth when he was about to fight with Haruto, but other people could barely get a reaction out of him. She was confused but she thought they’d talked enough. She wanted to go sleep.

She stood and yawned, “Well I think it’s time for us to all get some proper rest before this meeting. We’ll just let them ask questions and I can answer them as they come up once we tell them we’re all…experiments.”

Everyone looked relieved to be dismissed and trudged through the dormitory hallways to their respective rooms.

They were extremely lucky that the dorms were never a target.

Once Haruto entered the room behind him, L-Elf closed the door, trapping him between himself and the cold wall.

Haruto made a surprised noise but was also unable to completely hide his delight at spurring such a strong reaction from L-Elf. He smiled nervously at the other boy who was far closer than necessary, the toes of their shoes touching and L-Elf’s hands pressed against the wall trapping Haruto further. He could feel every breath the other took.

Haruto shivered in anticipation, though he was never quite sure what would happen with L-Elf.

He couldn’t speak as he managed to tear his eyes away from L-Elf’s for a split second glance a little lower and then back up.

_Michael why are you staring at me like that…?_

L-Elf let out an agitated breath through his nose, thinking he and Liselotte were both so very frustrating.

“Mikhail?”

“Better.” And he leaned in and kissed Haruto.

Haruto thought his lips were softer than he expected and he wondered with slight jealousy who taught the other boy how to kiss.

L-Elf shifted a little and kissed the corner of Haruto’s mouth. He didn’t want this to be the same as with Liselotte. He wanted to do this through action, as with every other important step of their relationship. He could say a novel’s worth of pretty words later when he had the luxury. He pulled back to look at him.

_Haruto, you said you loved me. Kiss me back. Otherwise I’m going to sleep._

Haruto’s face was red, he’d obviously heard the thought sent his way, and his hands tangled themselves in L-Elf’s shirt. He was nervous and didn’t look L-Elf completely in the eyes until L-Elf touched Haruto’s face lightly.

For now they could forget about everything else. It was okay and it was safe was what his eyes told him.

Haruto dragged him closer and kissed him back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yeah, boys kissed. (also this is on tumblr at stardustedwings)
> 
> Thanks everyone for the kind comments and kudos!!

**Author's Note:**

> To be continued


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